I chose to do my final presentation on religion and the way it affects happiness. More specifically, I would like to focus on the Islam religion. Islam is a religion practiced by Muslims all throughout the world. Even though Muslims have different values than those of other religions, they are still human and act similar to any other person in the world. We viewed a video in class a few months ago that showed just how similar most Muslims are to other people. Unfortunately, Muslims have a bad reputation because of tremendous events that have taken place throughout our U.S. history. It is unfortunate because these people often do not get the same experiences as we do. Despite the bad status Muslims carry in our country, mostly, all of these people, are just the same as you and me. According to the 10 Steps of Happiness by Bint Ahmad, happiness is defined as, “a mental state of well-being characterized by positive or pleasant emotions ranging from contentment to intense joy” (967). About 10 percent of our happiness comes from demographic factors, gender, age, ethnicity, and geographical factors. It is believed that if one were to follow the 10 steps of happiness, eternal happiness should be achieved. Although, there are other factors in the western world today that are associated with our happiness. According to Robert and Edward Skidelsky from the Introduction to Happiness and the Good life, “necessary goods all humans need are, health, security, respect, personality, friendship and leisure” (800). The main point that stood out to me in this section was respect. I feel that in our world today, a lot of Muslims don’t receive the respect they may want from the people they associate with. Today it may be harder for someone of the Islam religion to follow these steps to happiness because of the growing worldly problems and the distrust Americans have for Muslims. There is a video attached at the bottom of the page that goes along with my project. In this video, there are Muslims who try to explain why they are just as important as any other person living in the United States. They show that despite all the affliction from worldly events involved with their religion, they aren’t attached with these events and they deserve as much respect as any other American. They try to be happy with what they have despite the many problems involved with their religion. This project pushed me to think critically outside of my comfort zone. I had a difficult time at first deciding on a specific topic because there were so many different options to choose from. Although, as soon as I remembered the video we viewed in class, I knew that’s what I needed to do. I made the connection between religion and happiness and I felt that was a good topic to discuss. I feel that I have learned a lot about not judging someone based off of their religion. Everyone deserves to be happy no matter what type of values they have. It is simple to make an effort to make everyone feel good about themselves. My take-away from this project is that I need to be a friend to everyone and be respectful of their values no matter the circumstances. This project has helped me to achieve my educational goals by pushing me to be a better writer and observe the meaning behind important points. I sometimes have a hard time defining the greater meaning behind stories/readings, but I feel that this project has helped to push me to be better at this. I have learned a lot about religion, freedom, happiness, and nature from this class. It is a nice change from the typical core classes. Attached below the video, there is a file for my civic engagement activity. For this activity, I watched the Presidential debate and took notes about everything they disscussed.